I think I’ve come to the resolve that my first drafts are going to be messy no matter how long or little amount of time I take agonizing over the next paragraph, and that it would be to my benefit to just power through it and fix the errors during the editing phase. Something about not agonizing over every word has me worried, but logically speaking I don’t think it makes any difference.
In Ersatz the hardest part of the book for me to write was the climax, so much so that I thought it was the worst part of the book and I really wanted to change it or scrap it entirely and write something new. It turned out that almost all of my test audiences liked those bits the best out of the whole book and found them to be the most exciting.
Maybe it’s...

I frequent a writing forum that has a ‘Share Your Work’ section. It’s made for budding authors to post pieces of their work, (Usually about 2000 words long.) specify the level of constructive criticism they would like and then have the community pick it apart. I’m sure that sounds a bit like vultures feeding on roadkill, but in actuality it’s all very civil.
But I realized just now that even though you will likely gain some good tips from a constructive criticism forum such as that, you will probably never find out when your work is ‘good enough’ to be published or submitted.
I know this because I often go to ‘Share Your Work’ to constructively criticize others’ work. And today, right after I had...

After a brief lunch, Roch went to see Instructor Mithse. He wasn’t looking forward to another variation of the talk the Dean had given him. He had heard the same speech repeatedly all year.
Mithse was cleaning up the classroom when he came in. The classroom seemed strange to him so late in the evening. The slotted blinds had been lowered and remained open, letting the orange glow of the setting sun spill out onto the desks.
“Have a seat,” she said. She had a singular chair set in front of her desk for him to sit in. Not a good sign.
“I spoke to the Dean earlier today and he told me that he might be sending you to the reserves,” she said once she had taken her seat.
“Yeah,” Roch said. Mithse pulled out a puffer...

&#8220;Please state your name for the record,” Jonas said.
“Soeuc Kingan,” Soeuc said, leaning into the microphone. Jonas waved him off of it and shook his head.
“And why are you here today Mr. Kingan?”
“Uh, well… I’ve been conducting a series of experiments over the last few years–”
“Experiments involving what?” Jonas asked sharply.
“Tide. More specifically, the mechanism by which Tide occurs in the soil of the planet, and its effect on local organisms.”
“And you are putting this research on record for what purpose?”
“For the…” Soeuc trailed off and started patting his pockets. When he had found what he was looking for he held up a finger to...

He sucked in a breath to yell out, in the hopes that someone either inside the mall or walking back to their car would hear him, but the moment he drew in breath it was pushed back out of him, as if his lungs would no longer accept the oxygen they so desperately needed. He rasped helplessly on the concrete for someone to help him, but there was no one around to hear his struggle, and no one to watch him die.
As what little Jacob could see faded from view and the last inch of his life dwindled away, he was overtaken by a strange feeling that the world he was in was less tangible than it had seemed to be only moments earlier.
He became calm, acceptant of the fact that he could no longer breathe and that he was going to die. Then, suddenly, as if responding to his...

&#8220;People who don’t want to do their duty to this Academy. People who don’t want to help to resolve the conflict going on in the other part of the world.”
“We’re not helping the conflict,” Roch said, raising his voice to a point where he was almost shouting. “We’re contributing to it. There’s nothing to be gained by lending assistance to both sides. You’re only perpetuating it, and I am if too if I continue on here.”
The Dean suddenly surged forward and slammed his fist onto the desk, eyes wide and fastened intensely on Roch. “Watch your tone with me, boy,” he growled. “I have sat behind this desk for more than a decade, and served this continent for longer than you...

&#8220;So, given that the shell is travelling at 500 metres per second, and has been fired from a location that is 2.43 kilometres to the west, and given a wind force of 20 kilometres per hour blowing to the east, how long would it take to hit you right on the head? Rochons?”
Roch looked up from the paper on his desk, which he had been doodling on instead of working out the equation his teacher had presented. “I have no idea,” he admitted.
“Well, what part of the equation have you made it to on your paper there?”
Roch looked back down to his paper and felt his whole body tense up. Then after a long sigh he said “I’m just working on the hair at the moment.”
His instructor, named Mithse, cooly strode across the...